Why You Don’t Need Intercourse To Be Intimate

All right, so when I think about this idea of all or nothing with sex, Several different client scenarios come to mind, but the pattern is the same.

The pattern is, you know, the low libido partner is almost like afraid to start kissing, to start cuddling, to put a hand on their partner's leg because they kind of think, if I give them an inch, they're going to take a mile, right? And so then there's sort of this guardedness and this fear-based approach to sex, which of course, if you're listening to this, is the opposite of what you want.

And what happens here is two things.

So one, there's kind of the fear there, like I just said.

Two, you actually wind up having a lot less affection and physical intimacy because physical intimacy is so much broader than just intercourse.

But it's almost like something happened to us when we were growing up and sort of like, okay, did you get to first base? Did you get to second base? And then like, oh, you went all the way.

Well, now that you've gone all the way, you have to always go all the way.

It's like this weird invisible rule.

And it's like, who made that up? Because that's not actually correct.

But a lot of us have kind of just opted into it or felt like that's what's supposed to happen.

Or if we don't want to go all the way, something's wrong.

And that's a bad sign.

Now, also, if you're the higher libido partner who kind of always wants to take things there or not even that you're pushing it or pressuring it, but that you're just interested, like your partner knows you would say yes if that option were on the table.

And I just want to reframe that whole way of thinking about it for you guys because what really is the case is, you know, if you're kind of like you know i just haven't been feeling great physically lately or you know i've had a low libido or maybe maybe you just gave birth maybe you're having some some pelvic floor dysfunction There's infinite reasons why having intercourse might not be the most appealing thing to you right off the bat.

Even if you just have a more responsive type of desire or based on your hormones, if it just takes you a little bit longer to get in the mood, which, you know, if you're biologically female, that's going to be the case, right? Like...

there's a much longer warmup period that can be about 20 minutes or so versus somebody who's biologically male is going to have a quicker arousal pathway, if you will.

Okay.

So now everyone's different too.

It could be that, you know, you're female and you're already in the mood and your partner has not had much interest, that also happens, okay? So I don't want us to get hung up on that part of it.

But the part that's important is if you're the person with the lower desire, you might need some time and space to get in the mood.

You might also just need to know it's okay to kiss, it's okay to cuddle, and it doesn't always have to lead to more because...